neoliberalism

Nothing shows the crisis of neo-liberal capitalism more clearly than the popular uprising in France that is occurring under the banner of the “Yellow Vest” movement. Thousands are congregating in Paris over week-ends to protest against the intolerable burdens being imposed upon them in the name of “austerity” and to demand that resources be raised instead through taxing the rich. This movement had begun initially as a protest against the diesel price-hikes, but has now taken on a more general character and is drawing huge support from the people. There is an effort in liberal circles to portray the movement…

New findings from the International Labor Organization show that workers across many advanced and emerging economies continued to miss out on the gains from growth in 2017. Rather than trotting out the usual suspects – trade and technology – it is time for policymakers to place the blame where it belongs. For Full article please click here

Unlike in the worlds of business and politics, there is little scope for gossip in the world of economics. So, when multiple signals suggested that that there was a stand-off between the government and the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), the media made the most of it, with a multitude of stories reporting and explaining the nature of the spat and its implications. Given the formal economic arguments that must enter those discussions, there is much that the lay reader cannot process to assess which of the two institutions is right in this controversy. However, the thrust of the reportage…

About four years ago, I penned an article in this column titled, “A Sovereign Debt Story: Republic of Argentina vs NML Capital” (EPW, 17 May 2014). Many things have happened since then and it is time to write a private debt story now, Turkey’s story. Turkey and Argentina are twins in the sense that these countries suffered from almost simultaneous financial crises both in 2001 and 2018. Both are currently suffering from currency crises with potential spillover to the rest of the emerging markets, and there are those who argue that these twins may have triggered a crisis in the emerging markets…

Neoliberal economic policy—the framework of measures that preaches market fundamentalism but uses the state to engineer a redistribution of income and assets in favour of finance capital and big business—has lost its legitimacy. A huge financial crisis and a decade of recession or low growth, that have hurt most sections except the elite 1 per cent, have convinced the majority in many countries that neoliberalism is no alternative. That change in mood was revealed by the Brexit vote and the Trump victory among other developments. However, this has not setback but unleashed a new aggression on the part of the…

International Workers' Day grew out of 19th century working-class struggles in the United States for better working conditions and the establishment of an eight-hour workday. May 1 was chosen by the international labor movement as the day to commemorate the Haymarket massacre in May 1886. Ever since, May 1 has been a day of working-class marches and demonstrations throughout the world, although state apparatuses in the United States do their best to erase the day from public awareness. In the interview below, one of the world's leading radical economists, Jawaharlal Nehru University Professor Jayati Ghosh, who is also an activist…

This article traces the context in which this author served Argentina as both the chairman of the Central Bank of Argentina and former chairman of Securities and Exchange Commission of Argentina. As described, the efforts necessary for a country such as Argentina to achieve and maintain financial sovereignty are almost as great as the forces opposing such a possibility. While focusing on the specific case of Argentina and pertaining to a specific time in its history, this article offers insights that hopefully can lead to a better understanding of the global forces that condition the management of national economies in…

Its once again a time for exposés of big ticket scams. The headline hogger currently is the alleged huge Rs. 11,400 crore ‘scam’ unearthed in transactions through the Punjab National Bank (PNB) involving diamond merchants Nirav Modi and Mehul Choksi. That this is not an isolated occurrence is established by news of another Rs. 3,700 crore alleged fraud involving Vikram Kothari of Rotomac Pens being reported almost simultaneously. The full details of the possible fraud in either of these cases is yet to emerge. But underlying them is the suspicion that loans or guarantees of huge magnitudes were offered to…

Why is neoliberalism bad for India and Nepal? What are its major flaws? Mahabir Paudyal and Prashant Lamichhane from myRepublica caught up with Professor C.P. Chandrasekhar when he was in Kathmandu last week to discuss the impact of neo-liberal economic order in the two countries, and the prospects of a socialist-oriented economy in Nepal. Nepal and India adopted liberalization almost at the same time during the 1990s. Thirty years on, what kind of impact has it had in the two countries? You need to look at liberalization at two levels. Cross-country liberalization, which is a set or package of policies implemented…

September did not begin well for the Narendra Modi government. As it prepared for a makeover in the form of a cabinet reshuffle with elections 2019 in sight, news came that India’s GDP growth had slowed significantly to 5.7 per cent during the quarter April-June. This deceleration comes in the wake of a fall in growth rates from close to 8 per cent a year earlier to 6.1 per cent during January to March this year. As is to be expected the government has chosen to attribute this trend to short term shocks, which will not dislodge the economy from…